Honestly
by Ciara in cotton socks
Summary: The last time she saw him, Victoire Weasley fought with her boyfriend, Teddy Lupin.  Now she has to make it right and reconcile with him; she can't have the last thing he ever heard her say being 'I hate you'.


**A/N: Though I wish I could claim the ingenious idea of writing stories inspired by the beautiful songs of Melissa Polinar, it was in fact the brainchild of Vanity Sinning. This is part of my entry to her 'The Next Generation Musical Competition' on the HPFC forum. Each contestant was given five songs by a particular artist (in my case, Melissa Polinar) and had to write five different stories based on them about the same next generation characters. Mine, as you can see, are Teddy Lupin and Victoire Weasley, and this oneshot incorporates lyrics from the song 'Honestly'.**

**This is the third one-shot of my five, the first two being **_**Say You'll Stay **_**and Try respectively, and all feedback, both positive and constructively critical, is more than welcome. I hope you enjoy!**

**Kisses,**

**Ciara**

**/~/~/~/~/~/~/~/~/~/~/~/~/**

Victoire Weasley sat alone, arms curled protectively around herself. She felt sick to her stomach, her head spun when she moved even slightly and it was getting progressively harder to breathe. She ran shaking fingers through her long mane of strawberry blonde hair. Normally, she prided herself on keeping it immaculately but in the past few weeks her heart hadn't been in it. She had fought with Teddy, a huge, blazing argument complete with throwing ornaments and spiteful words, and she had stormed out of their tiny flat and gone to stay with Dom. She had a change of heart, of course, but when she went back to reconcile she found the flat empty, with no sign of Teddy. She'd talked to everyone who might know of his whereabouts- Auntie Ginny and Uncle Harry, Fred, Roxie, even Lily- but nobody had heard from him. She and Teddy had argued before, and all those other times he had gone off and pickled his liver for a couple of days before returning with his tail between his legs. This was just like those other times, she was sure of it.

"Vic," a soft voice said, airy and far-away. "Vic, come on. We'll be late."

Shaken from her reverie, she glanced up at her sister, who was standing over her wearing a nervous, worried expression. Dominique, as usual, was flawless. Her white-blonde hair streamed down her back in a neat braid and she wore a form-fitting black pencil dress and sky-high heels. She smiled sadly and offered Victoire a hand, which her sister took with a heavy, pained sigh.

The two of them moved, dream-like from the house into a large, open space filled with people, some of whom Victoire recognised and some of whom were complete strangers. A couple of them raised their hands in tentative greeting, but she merely shook her head hopelessly and their hands fell limply back to their sides once more.

"Are you sure you're up to this?" Dom whispered in her ear. Victoire couldn't muster up the courage to speak; instead, she merely nodded stonily. Dom gave her arm a comforting squeeze and steered her down the aisle. She settled her a couple of rows from the front, next to Harry and Ginny, the latter of whom gave a loud sniffle and wrapped Victoire up in a cuddle which was meant to be comforting but just made the struggle to breathe that much harder. She smiled the same weak smile she had been forcing out all day and faced the front with reluctant grace. And then she saw him. Teddy.

He was here! She had known he would be, of course, but she hadn't thought she would be able to see him. He was so close; she could almost smell his curious aroma of chocolate, new parchment and gunpowder. And she could make out every detail of his appearance; every freckle, every laughter line spreading out from his eyes, every individual strand of his bright turquoise hair. Her heart swelled with a mixture of affection and remorse. She couldn't believe how they had left things between them, spiteful and bitter. They had been love's young dream once upon a time, hadn't they? She remembered heady days of secret dalliances behind the greenhouses and silly little Valentine's gifts that had reduced her to tears with their sheer poignancy. Those were the things she cherished about her relationship with Teddy, the things that warmed her heart when she laid eyes on him. She didn't _want_ him to hate her. She didn't want to hate him. She just wanted them to go back to the sweet little bubble where the only things that intruded on their happiness were her family's good-natured interfering and the occasional prank or two. She had to tell him, she had to. She couldn't leave it like this.

"Teddy!" she exclaimed, breaking free of Ginny's hug and hurtling up the last hundred yards of the aisle to where he was waiting. She grasped his hand tightly and beamed with tears in her eyes. "I've missed you so, so much."

"Vic," Dom called plaintively, her slim fingers catching her wrist. "Vic, stop this."

"No Dom, you stop," Victoire groaned. "I have to apologise, I have to make it right. Please, just leave us be."

She wrenched her arm from Dominique's grasp and returned her attention to Teddy.

"I'm sorry we argued," she said thickly. "Honestly, I am. Please, just come home and I promise I'll never have a cross word with you again. Honestly Teddy, I won't. Just come home."

"Vic." It was Louis's voice this time, soft and gentle behind her. His hands, like Dom's, took a hold of her, but he didn't pull at her like their sister had. Instead, he stroked her forearms comfortingly and pressed his face up next to hers. "Vic, Teddy wouldn't want this, you know that."

"Why are you talking like that?" she asked fearfully. "'Teddy wouldn't want this'? Why are you talking like he's not here? He's right here, Louis."

"Yes," her little brother said evenly, smiling at Teddy. "But he's not _really_ here, not anymore. I think you know that, Victoire."

She stared at him, tears glistening in her eyes as a deep understanding passed between the two of them. Victoire's lip began to tremble, followed by her shoulder until finally her whole body was wracked with an uncontrollable shaking. She sagged under her own body weight, but Louis held firm behind her, keeping her upright and whispering incomprehensible, comforting nothings in her ear.

"H-he can't... he... Louis, he..."

"I know, I know," Louis said smoothly. "I know Vic."

"He can't be gone," she managed to choke out painfully. "He just can't. I mean, we- we fought and then I left and then he left and then I couldn't find him and then... then... and I never got to tell him. Th-the last time I saw him we argued and I never got to tell him h-how much I... how much..."

"So tell him," Louis said gently. "Tell him now, Victoire. You still feel him, right?"

"He's everywhere," she whispered. "Everywhere, all the time."

"So he can still hear you?"

"I-I guess."

"Then tell him."

Victoire nodded fearfully and turned her attention once again to her boyfriend's form. She took his cool hand in both of her own and squeezed gently.

"Oh," she sighed shakily. "Oh Merlin, it- it's been a while since my heart smiled Teddy. I think it's yearning for you. It misses you Teddy. _I_ miss you. What am I going to do now, you bloody pillock? How could you just leave me here on my own like this, eh? I need you Teddy. No one else compares to you, to who you've made me into. I remember the first time we kissed like it was yesterday. You came out of nowhere, so suddenly, and I didn't know what took over me. A-and what's unfair is…  
>is that I'm here and you're there."<p>

At this she faltered. Her voice shook and died. But Louis was still there, anchoring her, and now she could feel Dominique's presence on her other side. They gave her encouraging little smiles that steeled her and spurred her on. She swiped at her eyes and continued to speak in a stronger voice.

"The last time I saw you, we fought. We both said some dreadful things, things I can't even bear to think of, but what hurts the most isn't the vicious words, it's that the last thing you ever heard me say was that I hated you. Honestly, I've never felt like that about you, Teddy Lupin, not once. Not even that time you put lumpy cold custard in my shoes at the Burrow. The truth is that you are my light when there is only dark. I've never once felt alone when I had you, not once. You've been the one I just can't be apart from. Time and time again you take me there, high above the clouds. B-before you, I didn't think love existed, or at least I never thought I was capable of feeling it. But you changed all that, didn't you? You came out of the shadows of my family and you swept me off my feet like one of the princesses from those Muggle fairytales Aunt Hermione used to read to us growing up. You were wonderful and sweet and a little bit of an idiot. You bought me pretty little gifts and you had ridiculous hair and sometimes you could be a real grump in the morning, and I loved- _love_- you in spite of and because of all of those things. And-and it hurts more than anything, being here without you, but I feel you around me, watching, listening, and I think it might be alright, in the end. And anyway, someday I know we'll be together soon 'cause… cause honestly, your love completes me. Completely. Completely and utterly. And it's like Hermione's fairytales. Two people who love each other as entirely as we do can't not have a happily ever after now, can they? We'll get ours Teddy, in the end. Honestly, we will, and I'll love you with every fibre of my being until it happens. Your love completes me, Teddy Remus Lupin, always has and always will."

She took a deep, shaking breath and dropped his hand, turning into the waiting arms of Louis and Dominique and finally allowing the tears to spill over. Numb, she allowed herself to be led back to the makeshift pew which had been erected for the occasion and was wedged tightly between her two siblings. She heard what the ancient, tufty-haired man at the front of the congregation was saying in snatches- 'bright student', 'loyal friend', 'tragic accident', 'Muggle tram'- but she didn't really listen. Instead, she clasped Louis and Dom's hands so tightly she feared she would cut off their circulation, and focused on the tuft of turquoise hair she could see peeking out over the coffin's rim. She made a pact with herself, a pact to keep Teddy alive in herself as long as she lived. He would be the uncontrolled laughter that exploded from her when Fred cracked a joke, the mischievous glint in her eye when she playfully teased Louis or Rose, the spring in her step when she walked, the gentle sweetness with which she treated her patients at St. Mungo's.

And honestly, even though she knew it was infantile, she believed that she and Teddy would have their happily ever after. One day.


End file.
